Svetlana Kuznetsova swept aside a tired Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova 6-2, 6-1 in an all-Russian final to win the Kremlin Cup on Saturday.
Kuznetsova dominated throughout against Pavlyuchenkova, who acknowledged being exhausted as she played her 10th match in 12 days.
For the two-time Grand Slam winner Kuznetsova, it is her first title in her home nation and comes at her 11th attempt at the Kremlin Cup.
Kuznetsova hailed Pavlyuchenkova, who was struggling for fitness after she won the Generali Ladies tournament in Austria last week, as “a real fighter” for playing through the pain.
Pavlyuchenkova held serve with difficulty in the early stages, but struggled to move around the court and was soon overwhelmed.
From 2-2 in the first set, Kuznetsova won the next nine games as she cruised to victory in 1 hour, 19 minutes.
“It was painful that the final turned out like that, but I am happy that I made the final,” Pavlyuchenkova said. “I could not put any pressure on my left leg when serving, so the serve was not working at all. Plus Sveta was playing great. It seemed everything was going her way.”
It was Kuznetsova’s 15th career title and her first since the Citi Open in Washington last year.
Pavlyuchenkova had been bidding to become only the second woman to retain the Kremlin Cup title, matching the 2004 achievement of Anastasia Myskina, who is now Kuznetsova’s coach.
Top-seeded Marin Cilic of Croatia reached the men’s final with a straightforward 6-3, 6-1 win over Russian wild-card entry Evgeny Donskoy.
The big-serving Cilic faced just one break point as he held serve throughout, hitting 10 aces and landing 70 percent of first serves.
In yesterday’s final, he was to face second-seeded Roberto Bautista Agut of Spain, who beat fourth-seeded German Philipp Kohlschreiber 6-4, 6-4.
The Major League Baseball World Series trophy is headed to Los Angeles, but the party is extending all the way to Japan. People milled around local train stations yesterday morning in Tokyo as newspaper extras were ready to roll off the presses, proclaiming Japanese stars Shohei Ohtani and Yoshinobu Yamamoto as world champions along with their Dodgers teammates after a stirring Game 5 victory over the New York Yankees. The 30-year-old is a national hero in Japan whose face adorns billboards and TV adverts all over the country. Ohtani this year became the first player in history to hit 50 home runs and
STAR IN DOUBT: After partially dislocating his shoulder in a feetfirst slide into second base, the status of Japanese slugger Ohtani is uncertain for Game 3 as he undergoes tests Yoshinobu Yamamoto on Saturday walked back to his dugout and made the slightest tip of his cap to cheering fans. He left Japan for moments like this, an opportunity to put the Los Angeles Dodgers in control of the World Series. Yamamoto allowed one hit over 6-1/3 innings and Freddie Freeman homered for the second straight night as Los Angeles beat the New York Yankees 4-2 for a 2-0 Series lead. However, the Dodgers head to New York uncertain whether Shohei Ohtani can play after their biggest star partially dislocated his left shoulder on a slide at second base. “We’re going to get
Three-time reigning world champion Kaori Sakamoto on Saturday led a Japanese podium sweep at Skate Canada, locking up a second straight Canadian women’s title despite two falls in her free skate. Sakamoto, who led 19-year-old American Alysa Liu after the short program, looked a little tight during her jazzy free skate, falling on a Salchow jump and again on a triple flip while fighting to hang on to a few other moves. Her second-best free skate score of 126.24 was enough for gold in the second Grand Prix event of the season in Halifax, Nova Scotia. She finished with 201.21 points, well ahead
Kevin Durant and Devin Booker on Monday combined for 63 points as the Phoenix Suns sent LeBron James and the Los Angeles Lakers tumbling to their first defeat of the season. Booker bagged 33 points and Durant 30 to give the Suns a thrilling 109-105 win at Phoenix’s Footprint Center, avenging the Lakers’ 123-116 win over the Suns in Los Angeles on Friday last week. The Lakers arrived in Phoenix buoyed by an impressive 3-0 start to the campaign under new head coach J.J. Redick. They looked poised to keep that run going after making a blistering start, sprinting into an early 26-8